What can COP30’s outcome tell us about the future role of universities?

Welcome! By the time you read this, COP30 will be wrapping up in Brazil. The big outcome will likely be the Belém Declaration on Global Green Industrialization (at least at time of writing, Monday 17 November, though things can change rapidly). A significant throughline of the declaration is social inclusion, particularly its focus on the creation of new jobs.

My immediate reaction is that there is a very clear role for universities to play in achieving the declaration’s ambitions. The skills agenda and its transition is a place higher education has already been operating in for some time. But there’s an additional challenge. While universities need to help drive down carbon emissions, they are themselves contributors to rising emissions.

Today, QS launches the 2026 Sustainability Rankings, and to coincide with its release, QS Insights is focusing on sustainability. In this week’s QS Midweek Brief, we explore how universities can start teaching more sustainably. We also look at how universities can better engage with the public to advocate for themselves.

There’s plenty more in the full magazine online.

Stay insightful,
Anton John Crace
Editor-in-Chief, QS Insights Magazine
QS Quacquarelli Symonds

Teaching sustainably

By Gauri Kohli

In Brief

• Academic travel is fuelling the climate crisis, generating up to half of a university's carbon footprint. Prospective students are demanding change.
• Deeply rooted academic travel culture, motivated by professional rewards and personal attraction, uses equivalent to 300 million litres of fuel across 22 institutions alone.
• Universities must move from flying sustainably to delivering global outcomes without flying. Implement carbon budgets, climate literacy, and low-carbon alternatives like rail travel.

Internationalisation has shaped modern higher education, but the flights that make it possible have come at a cost. According to some measures, flights alone can generate up to half of a university’s carbon footprint.

This has led institutions to now ask a difficult question: can global engagement be sustainable?

To answer it, some are experimenting with carbon budgets, virtual and hybrid exchanges, and low-carbon partnerships. And it is no longer to just cut emissions; students now expect it. As per a QS report ‘Shaping sustainable futures: Students, universities and green skills,’ nearly 48 percent of prospective students say they would choose a more sustainable university over one ranked in the global top 100.

The hidden culture of academic travel

The International Education Sustainability Group (IESG) was founded in 2023, by international education professionals passionate about climate action to provide the sector with tools to understand and mitigate its impact. It’s Climate Action Barometer Global Wave 2024 benchmark measured emissions associated with travel-related to international education by staff and students from a group of 22 institutions during 2022-2023, across the UK, Australia and New Zealand.

According to its benchmark, nearly 700,000 tonnes of carbon emissions were linked to staff and student travel, including 190,000 international enrolments, the equivalent of roughly 300 million litres of fuel. At a notional €100 per tonne carbon price, that’s about €70m from just 22 institutions.

A 2019 study by Professor Robin Shields,for the University of Bath at that time, estimated that aviation emissions from international student travel in 2014 ranged from 14 to 39 megatons, comparable to the annual emissions of countries like Latvia or Tunisia. Although emissions per student are declining due to more regional study patterns, institutions rarely account for student-travel emissions; most tracking still focuses only on staff air miles.

Collaboration is vital, but Stefan Gössling, a Professor of Tourism Research at Linnaeus University and Human Ecology at Lund University, Sweden, argues that much of the mobility that underpins it is driven by deeply human, rather than purely professional, motivations.

Professor Gössling, whose research focuses on the sustainability of tourism, transport and mobilities, offers a pragmatic assessment of the relevant factors, arguing that it is attractive for academics to visit conferences for the same reasons it is attractive for business travellers: “nice hotels, nice locations, nice company, and all paid for.”

This perspective gets to the crux of the issue: the carbon cost of internationalisation is directly linked to the culture of academic travel, a culture that is set in its ways. He challenges the notion that physical presence is always necessary for high-impact collaboration: “I have worked with hundreds of people I have never met, and usually more efficiently, because the work has been focused on the issue at hand.”

And since long-haul flights, the biggest contributor to emissions, don’t have greener options yet, this cultural norm becomes even harder to break.

Professor Gössling’s research refutes the idea of easy technological fixes, asserting that “sustainable aviation is a myth.” He points to the non-sustainability of biofuels at scale and the lack of viable synthetic fuels, noting recent retreats from ambitious net-zero targets by international bodies. His conclusion is uncompromising: “Unless we go by train, there is no sustainable mobility.”

Another question is whether it is the moral imperative of universities to drastically recalibrate their operations, moving the conversation from ‘how can we fly sustainably?’ to ‘how can we deliver global outcomes without flying?’

For institutions, navigating this reality requires a “tricky balancing act,” according to Ailsa Lamont, Co-founder and CEO of the IESG. She argues that genuine change requires environmental sustainability to be a “key pillar of strategy that is pushed from the top,” committing universities to three core actions.

First, she says universities need to build climate literacy among staff and students, so everyone understands the impact of travel. Second, they should use their influence with partners and suppliers to push for more sustainable practices.

“They must actively avoid generating emissions by finding alternatives to travel where possible, and where travel is still deemed essential, minimising them through the application of sensible policy and guidelines,’ she tells QS Insights.

Cutting flights is also more inclusive, which matches the values of UN Sustainable Development Goals. According to Dr Debra Rowe, President of the US Partnership for Education for Sustainable Development, many higher education institutions already have the technologies for virtual learning and hybrid classes so the cost to switch over is not very high. “Also, for universities that are not within the European network for low cost air travel, the savings from reducing the number of flights can be very substantial,” she says.

From carbon budgets to structural reform

Universities are now backing their climate promises with stricter travel policies, financial checks and changes to how decisions are made. The shift to a low-carbon model is not cheap; it demands significant financial investment in technology, training and complex structural change. The upfront cost can be a major barrier, particularly for institutions facing tight budgets, experts say.

The most effective strategies make carbon costs visible. At the University of Gothenburg in Sweden, staff receive regular data on travel emissions and share climate-smart travel practices, raising awareness about travel’s climate impacts.

Elsewhere, universities such as University of Bristol and University of California are adopting similar measures, tightening travel approvals, building carbon budgets and requiring staff to compare emissions before booking.

The University of Tasmania is certified carbon neutral under the Australian Government’s Climate Active Standard. Its 2022 Emissions Reduction Strategic Plan targets a 50 percent cut in emissions by 2030 (from 2015 levels) and introduces an internal carbon budget to curb air travel and other emissions.

Many universities in the US have been involved with climate advocacy group, Second Nature, which has been helping over 400 colleges and universities achieve their climate action goals.

For years, these universities have had commitments and actions to go toward creating a net zero campus. Additionally, institutions are pledging to get to net-zero emissions under The United Nation’s Race to Zero campaign.

Lamont notes that the most effective strategies she has observed involve a crucial combination of elements: “equipping people to understand the climate impact of travel, providing practical guidelines, and crucially, tracking and publicly reporting the carbon cost of all travel.”

Sustainable travel practices can include helping staff select travel routes that generate fewer emissions, such as using the Smart Travel Tool from Atmosfair, which rates routes and modes of transport based on the smallest carbon footprint, she adds.

As per the latest Climate Action Barometer by the IESG, 4 out of 21 institutions indicated that their international teams have dedicated budgets to invest in climate action.

According to Dr Stephen Robinson, Director and Professor, Champlain College, Dublin Campus, his field of US study abroad in Europe is faced with a dilemma.

“We all want these valuable global experiences for our students, but there is an environmental cost to such academic travel,” says Dr Robinson, who is also an expert on climate action and sustainability in study abroad.

Around 85 percent of his programme’s carbon footprint comes from student flights, not only to and from the destination, but from additional travel students take once they are abroad.

“Some study abroad programmes operate for as little as two weeks in the country, and to me that’s a lot of flight emissions for likely a lesser academic return. Unfortunately, the trend in US study abroad is an increasing student demand for these short-term programmes at the expense of longer-term ones, so we still have a lot of work to do,” he notes.

“We can reduce those by being more strategic about how often and where we travel, and especially the mode of transportation we choose. Within Europe, where the rail network is well developed, travel by train comes with significant emissions savings when compared to flying. So, institutions need to ask if travel is necessary. They also should promote and even incentivise low carbon modes of travel where feasible,” he suggests.

Even where low-carbon options exist, many programmes report continued demand for short, flight-heavy trips, fuelling a quiet sense of defeatism that behaviour change lags policy.

On the academic side, the biggest structural barrier in reducing travel-induced emissions is its reward system. Career advancement has long been tied to physical presence, conferences, keynote speeches and overseas fieldwork.

The inherent difficulty in this change is reflected by Professor Gössling’s observation. His personal impression is that “everybody is still flying the world.” This suggests that policies must be backed by institutional resolve to enforce genuine behavioural shifts, such as those colleagues who, Professor Gössling notes, are proactively “making the switch to no longer fly.”

Gauri Kohli specialises in writing and reporting on higher education news, including analysis on higher education trends, policies and the edtech sector. Her writing focuses on international education, study abroad, student recruitment trends and policies, with focus on India as a market. She has also covered workplace and hiring trends, corporate practices, work-life features, startup trends and developments, real estate for leading publications and media houses in India and abroad for the last 18 years, including Hindustan Times, a leading national daily newspaper in India.

Put your positive hat on

Why higher education needs advocates more than ever

By Viggo Stacey

In Brief

• Public trust higher education is falling globally. Sustained media attacks and pervasive negative narratives are eroding faith in higher education's value, demanding urgent and effective advocacy from institutions worldwide.
• Although the sector faces broad criticism, professors and scientists retain high public trust (up to 85% in the UK). Institutions must leverage their researchers to counter negative narratives like "Mickey Mouse" degrees.
• Universities need to be authentic and emotional. Move beyond administrative language. Institutions must tell powerful, human stories of research impact and students' changed lives to demonstrate real social value and paint a positive future.

An old adage in newsrooms, attributed sometimes to George Orwell, other times to William Randolph Hearst or Lord Northcliffe, states that news is something somebody doesn't want printed.

Real journalists seek truth. They strive towards transparency, ask uncomfortable questions and seek to highlight failings or uncover injustice or wrongdoing. Sound familiar? In many ways, higher education and journalism are either side of the same coin.

Other times journalism can be about something else – a topic some might consider unserious, a media pile on, or merely entertainment.

Power of the papers

The UK’s tabloids, historically some of the most scathing publications about higher education, are losing their print readership with the meteoric rise of digital media.

The Sun, one of a number of publications that has now stopped publishing its circulation figures, saw its daily average print readership fall from 3.59 million in March 2000 to around 1.2 million in March 2020.

But while print readership has declined, online audiences have surged. Despite being found as the most untrustworthy news outlet (with 59 percent of Britons saying so), The Sun still attracts audience of 25.1m in the UK per month, slightly behind the Mail Online with 25.3m.

A quick search for university coverage on The Sun’s website shows a story about the egging of a student’s house by classmates, Oxford Union “slammed” for inviting Kevin Spacey for a talk and jobs that earn up to £60k a year without the need for a degree. Not exactly the most supportive messaging for higher education – and probably headlines the sector doesn’t want peddled.

Conservative media publications elsewhere question the premise of international education’s mission, conflating overseas students with crises such as the housing situation in Canada or international students with immigration.

And while it may be easy to dismiss the coverage as politically motivated and unserious (another outlet, Spectator, described SOAS in London as “one of the country’s worst universities”, in stark contrast to its international reputation in both the QS and Times Higher Education rankings), media’s low opinion appears to be pervasive. A 2021 Education Writers Association survey found that half of the US K-12 journalists thought public elementary, middle and high schools were going in the right direction and the other half said the opposite. But among journalists covering higher education, answers were more negative. Almost 60 percent said it was heading in the wrong direction.

A more recent Pew survey found 70 percent of Americans think higher education in the country is generally “going in the wrong direction”, up from the 56 percent in 2020. Ipsos Canada research recently found that only 48 percent of Canadians believe a university of college diploma is worth the investment. In Australia, public confidence in universities dropped from 81.1 percent in 2008 to just 67.9 percent in 2023.

In the 18 months since QS Insights last highlighted this issue (Issue 17, March 2024), it appears that little has been achieved to turn the tide against the hostile narrative.

“It's no secret that various outlets can be right-leaning or left-leaning,” says Nick Anderson, now at the American Council on Education (ACE) and a former education correspondent at Washington Post for close to two decades.

“Frankly, we assume that news reporters in the mainstream media are making their best effort, in good faith, to understand all sides of the issues that they cover.”

How to get ahead with the public

For all the criticism, it is clear how dependent journalists interested in balanced, evidence-based expertise are on the work of universities.

On just one day in November, Canada’s The Globe and Mail spoke with a University of Sussex professor in the UK for a story on elections in Tanzania, The New York Times looked to University of Colorado School of Law for insights on the business situation at Tesla and, The Australian quoted Queensland University of Technology professor, Lidia Morawska, on her concerns about the “age of anti-science”.

For many, the rise of anti-science goes hand in hand with the increasing denunciation of higher education.

However, the Veracity Index from 2024 by Ipsos found that trust in professors and teachers among Brits was at 85 percent each (an increase of nine and seven points since 2023, respectively). Some 79 percent of people trusted scientists to tell the truth, a rise from 74 percent in 2023.

Another survey from the UCL Policy Lab in October found that 63 percent of Britons say universities have a positive impact against only 6 percent who say negative. The public clearly favours one of higher education’s great assets – its researchers and academics.

But satisfaction with higher education is lower among non-graduates. In the UCL research, 81 percent of grads say universities are good for the country, while among non-grads this drops to 55 percent.

Surveys like this chime with the findings of the Education Writers Association half a decade ago; it is more difficult to convince non-degree holders about the value of higher education.

The UCL survey also found that while only 23 percent would like to see a reduction in the number of international students, half of Britons think universities offer too many ‘Mickey Mouse’ degrees. The term, used first by higher education minister Margaret Hodge in 2003, has become the bane of the life of any professional advocate of UK higher education.

Earlier this year, Radio 4’s Today presenter, Justin Webb, used it to describe media studies, which hit a nerve with Amelia Fairney, Head of Strategy and Communications at Shout Out UK, a social enterprise seeking to counter disinformation through political & media literacy.

“In 2025, with the digital environment already on the verge of being overrun with AI slop, misinformation and divisive and harmful messaging, what possible value could people trained in the critical analysis of media messaging, its production and dissemination via the digital media environment and the impact of this on our wider society, bring to the future workplaces of the UK,” she asked ironically in message on LinkedIn.

Speaking with QS Insights, Fairney notes, “There's a lot of language around digital skills and the skills that are needed for the digital economy. I don’t buy that those are distinct from the humanities because the skills that are needed more and more are critical thinking, the ability to evaluate different information and its integrity, and how much it's worth paying attention to certain kinds of information.”

The humanities, she adds, instils these skills.

An experienced communications professional, Viggo joined QS as PR Specialist in late 2024. As a former journalist, he seeks to gain traction in the press for the organisation’s sector-leading data and insights, drive thought leadership strategy and manage the reputation of the company. He is passionate about personal stories and the impact of international education on individuals across the globe.